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Home  »  The Book of Sorrow  »  Emma Lazarus (1849–1887)

Andrew Macphail, comp. The Book of Sorrow. 1916.

XXI. Interlude. Epochs. i. Surprise

Emma Lazarus (1849–1887)

WHEN the stunned soul can first lift tired eyes

On her changed world of ruin, waste, and wrack,

Ah, what a pang of aching sharp surprise

Brings all sweet memories of the lost past back,

With wild self-pitying grief of one betrayed,

Duped in a land of dreams where Truth is dead!

Are these the heavens that she deemed were kind?

Is this the world that yesterday was fair?

What painted images of folk half-blind

Be these who pass her by, as vague as air?

What go they seeking? there is naught to find.

Let them come nigh and hearken her despair….